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Episode #135: Siham Lahmine

Owner & Cultural Curator

Morocco Travel Organizer

Episode #135: Siham Lahmine
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Guest Bio

Siham Lahmine is the founder of Morocco Travel Organizer and a pioneering force in Morocco’s culinary and cultural tourism scene. With a decade of experience leading immersive food-focused adventures, Siham designs luxury heritage tours that celebrate the country’s rich traditions, flavors, and hospitality. As a proud Moroccan woman and local expert, she offers travelers an authentic, deeply personal connection to the heart of Moroccan culture.

Blending deep culinary knowledge with storytelling, Siham guides guests through vibrant souks, historic medinas, and family kitchens. Her work has gained international recognition — including hosting celebrity chef Ainsley Harriot — and she remains passionate about preserving Morocco’s food heritage while empowering women in tourism.

Show Summary

In this episode of the Big World Made Small Adventure Travel Podcast, host Jason Elkins speaks with Siham Lahmine, cultural curator and founder of Morocco Travel Organizer. Siham shares her journey from growing up in a food-loving household to becoming a trailblazer in Morocco’s tourism industry, where she now leads luxury culinary and heritage tours.

The conversation explores the powerful role of women in shaping Morocco’s food culture, the challenges they face in a male-dominated tourism landscape, and the importance of storytelling in creating unforgettable travel experiences. Siham also offers practical advice for those considering a career in travel — and why personality often matters more than credentials.

Key Takeaways

  • ✓ Siham founded Morocco Travel Organizer to showcase Morocco through food, culture, and luxury experiences.
  • ✓ Women in Moroccan tourism face cultural and structural challenges, but the landscape is slowly evolving.
  • ✓ Moroccan food is more than a meal — it’s a story of identity, hospitality, and tradition.
  • ✓ Siham’s culinary roots began at home, influenced by generations of women in her family.
  • ✓ Guests are drawn to the behind-the-scenes stories and rituals that make Moroccan cuisine meaningful.
  • ✓ Time and care are essential ingredients in traditional Moroccan cooking.
  • ✓ Strong interpersonal skills can outweigh formal education in the travel industry.
  • ✓ The role of women in tourism continues to grow, but progress requires persistence and community support.
  • ✓ Aspiring professionals should get firsthand experience before fully committing to a tourism career.

What You’ll Find on Morocco Travel Organizer

  • ✓ Custom-crafted culinary tours led by a Moroccan cuisine expert
  • ✓ Luxury heritage itineraries focused on culture, food, and storytelling
  • ✓ Women-led and locally operated travel experiences
  • ✓ Guided tours of Fes, medinas, souks, and local food markets
  • ✓ Authentic immersion into Moroccan traditions and hospitality

Learn more about Morocco Travel Organizer and connect with Siham at:

https://moroccotravelorganizer.com/

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Podcast Transcript

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Jason Elkins (00:01.818)
Welcome back everybody to another episode of the Big World Made Small podcast for the adventure traveler. Very excited today. I had an opportunity to speak with my next guest a few weeks ago and was just super excited about her energy and what she’s doing in the world. So I asked her to come back on. Today we’ve got Siham Lahmine She is the owner and cultural curator at Morocco Travel Organizer. Siham, nice to see you again.

Happy to have you on the show.

Siham Lahmine (00:33.326)
Thank you, Jason. Nice to see you again too. I’m glad to be on the show.

Jason Elkins (00:36.234)
This is, yeah, this is gonna be so much fun. I’m kind of a foodie. think last time we spoke, I was telling you that at one point in my life, I’ve never been to Morocco, but I had three tagines in the house and a couple of Moroccan cookbooks and I was really into Moroccan food, still really enjoy Moroccan food. So I know we’re gonna discuss that a bit. And before we do that,

One of the things you’d mentioned, I had you fill out a form and you put something on there. said you were, it’s Morocco’s first local woman owned culinary and luxury heritage tours. That’s a mouthful. Can you help me unpack that? We’ll call it a, you know, a little elevator pitch, help our listeners understand what it is you do. And then we’re going to dig into your history and background to figure out why it is you do what.

Siham Lahmine (01:29.57)
Yeah, absolutely. So like there is a missing angle in the tourism industry for women taking off and doing something on their own, especially in the tourism industry. It’s still mostly like dominated by men. And when we’re speaking about culinary, that’s also a different concept in Morocco. I’m not going to say it’s like a different concept yet because I’ve been working on it like for more than 10 years.

However, there isn’t a lot of competition in this specific industry. So I’ve tried to specialize into what I love, which is food, and also organize luxury heritage tours at the same time, balancing between culinary experiences and luxury heritage tours, all in Morocco, and from a women’s point of view at the same time. So this is what I’m trying to do.

Jason Elkins (02:19.818)
I love it. A couple of questions came out of that. All right. So you’d mentioned that kind of, well, I think I’ll just share what I heard is that the tourism industry kind of this space is predominantly, I guess, dominated by men is what I heard you say. So when you said that, were you specifically talking about Morocco in general, or was it more, more specific to Morocco?

Siham Lahmine (02:22.434)
Yeah.

Siham Lahmine (02:36.728)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Siham Lahmine (02:49.506)
Yeah, well, I mean, I’m going to say from my experience, maybe it’s Africa in general, because I am like on LinkedIn, on other platforms, and I am on other communities with women-owned businesses all around the world. Like the challenges that they have is nothing like compared to the challenges that we have. Like there are so many women-owned businesses abroad. However, there are few like in Africa in general.

And I am based in North Africa. That’s where Morocco is based, which is literally like faith in Spain, Europe.

Jason Elkins (03:24.296)
All right. So how much do you want to dig into that with me? Because I guess the next question I ask you, why is that? What is that culturally about Morocco or Africa that that creates those those challenges? Should we go there?

Siham Lahmine (03:40.642)
Yeah, like, actually, like our King has been great. That’s the first thing. Like his way of changing Morocco is that he gives rights to the women. And this is a couple of years ago and into our institution. So like the women can lead and take over. There are many programs that encourage women in other crafts and other careers to just like take over, be leaders, be present and don’t be scared.

Just in terms of tourism, it’s not like the king is not supporting it, it is fully supporting it. However, women are still afraid to take this step onwards and then do something like creative. I know that there are right now other women who are specializing in other things, but we are only few. We might be three or four women in the country, all of it that I am aware of, and each one is doing something different. So right now my specialty is culinary because this is what I’ve been doing for 10 years.

or 12 years even since 2013. And I’ve been doing it to another company and like later on, I just decided I need to start something on my own that is going to be local, woman owned, one woman, which is me, basically. And so like really lead this like with more passion and showing travelers our culture through food. This is the main goal from the whole business.

Jason Elkins (05:05.417)
Okay, what I got out of what you just said was that legally the government, the systems are in place that women can do this. There’s nothing stopping them. But maybe what I heard is culturally or historically things have gotten in the way of women making the choice.

to do that and maybe some of that stuff still lingers but then there’s a few people like yourself that say, screw it, I can do it, there’s nothing stopping me and I’m just gonna do it. Is that right? Am I hearing you correctly?

Siham Lahmine (05:43.406)
You actually like got it, got it perfectly. So in terms of what is culturally common is that the man is the one like who’s providing to the like, he is the one who is providing in general. However, things have changed in Morocco massively. Like women start to work, women are going to university, sometimes even more than men right now. So there are many changes that are going on in Morocco. It’s just the tourism industry that is

still lacking. This is the only thing because when people are thinking about tourism, they’re thinking about it is being a business that is not stable. mean, anything could happen. And the first like job or the first industry that gets like damaged is tourism. That’s the first thing. So it’s a really sensible like project to start with other women like with man can do whichever like even though something will happen with tourism.

Then they can do it and like they can go and do hard work, labor, things like that. While for a woman, like she’s viewed the most as being a teacher, being at like a more stable job that provides for her more than tourism. I mean, tourism as a word in my home was never or in my family in general. And believe me, I’m coming from a big family. So like tourism as a word is not even coming in my family.

Like nobody has ever anticipated for me to take this like this step and be in industry. However, like by time people start to get used to it and just accept it. That’s all.

Jason Elkins (07:19.914)
Here I am, I’m doing my thing. You know what? What a great opportunity to go further into your past and have that discussion. So you said big family, boy, there’s so many things to you, to unpack here. You said big family, trust me, I got a big family. All right, tell us more about that.

Siham Lahmine (07:22.402)
Yeah.

Siham Lahmine (07:38.03)
Yeah, sure. So like my family is coming like from, I would say like I have almost 22 uncles and aunties in Scotland. And like I have so many cousins, obviously. So like my family is all over the country and even abroad. Some are living in USA, some are living in Italy, some in France.

Jason Elkins (07:49.906)
Okay, wow, all right.

Siham Lahmine (08:04.654)
I think Asia is the only place that we haven’t been there yet. I’m getting this word yet. And it will go. we are in the countryside, my family are in the countryside, in Kanetara, which is a city closer about, I only live with my parents and that’s all. So we don’t have any family related here. Whenever there is a big ceremony or celebration, we need to travel to celebrate with our family.

Jason Elkins (08:08.476)
Okay.

Siham Lahmine (08:34.274)
But most of my family are located like close to Rabat. This is where they are.

Jason Elkins (08:34.493)
Okay.

Jason Elkins (08:37.93)
So did I hear you correctly? You don’t have siblings, but you’ve got a ton of cousins and aunts and uncles. But as far as siblings, it’s just you with your parents, is that right?

Siham Lahmine (08:50.275)
I have one brother who doesn’t even live here, he’s living now in Germany. And following he has a master degree over there.

Jason Elkins (08:54.474)
Okay.

All right. But did you grow up, you said Fez? Is that right? Is that where you live? So you grew up in Fez. So it doesn’t sound like you had a lot of family in Fez. So it wasn’t like when you were growing up, let me back up. I remember when I was young, grew up kind of in a small town. And quite often when I left the house to go do something, I was reminded, hey, this is a small town. You’ve got a big family.

Siham Lahmine (09:00.586)
Yeah, that’s where I grew up with my parents and my brother.

Siham Lahmine (09:13.326)
Yeah!

Jason Elkins (09:26.344)
behave yourself because whatever you do, we’re going to hear about it. So I’m curious, was it like that for you growing up?

Siham Lahmine (09:29.122)
Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, well, I mean here, this is what is different. Or maybe it’s the same, but even different Jason. The community is your family. So like, even though I don’t have my cousin here or my relative, I need to behave in front of my community. Otherwise, gossip will spread out. So that’s not going to work well for me.

Jason Elkins (09:41.17)
Yeah.

Jason Elkins (09:56.316)
And I don’t know, but I suspect there may be some cultural differences between you and I and where I grew up and where you grew up and maybe the sense of community, you know, in Morocco and other places around the world is a little bit more like everybody’s kind of watching. You have expectations and standards that you live up to or maybe.

Siham Lahmine (10:07.416)
Yeah.

Jason Elkins (10:18.182)
some some communities in the US if they’re not family related to you they kind of don’t care what you do I mean they might criticize you might judge you but but nobody’s gonna step in and really you know try and steer you down onto the right path they’re probably just gonna sit back and watch the train wreck and say boy that was dumb so I

Siham Lahmine (10:38.87)
No, actually like they care. So what happened? Like your neighbor, he’s basically your second father or your second mother. So like all the neighbors, this is the statue that they have here. So like, as an example, if I am a little girl and playing with other girls or are not that great, or like are saying, as an example, some bad words, and one of the neighbor passed by and saw me playing with them.

It might say go to your home or otherwise I’m going to tell your parents about what you’ve been doing. So like it this power on you. That’s why like everybody’s behaving and we take like we look after our neighbors as our like I would say as I said second mothers and fathers. This is what they are.

Jason Elkins (11:10.538)
Jason Elkins (11:24.828)
You’re smiling, so I’m assuming that you think that’s endearing and charming and that you like that type of scenario. But I suspect you know some people that grew up in those same neighborhoods that didn’t really like having someone looking over their shoulder all the time and maybe resisted that, maybe even left the country and went to Germany or something. Well, I don’t know if Germany’s, I don’t know.

Siham Lahmine (11:31.372)
Yeah.

Siham Lahmine (11:36.174)
Mm-hmm.

Siham Lahmine (11:48.622)
Yeah, it’s not like that.

Jason Elkins (11:52.267)
Germany has got its own cultural differences. But I’m curious, are there people in Morocco that just really don’t like their neighbor looking out for them and are like, I got to get the heck out of this place?

Siham Lahmine (12:05.568)
It’s about, I would say, how we grew up mentally the most. I’m not like taking the exceptions. Of course, there will be some exceptions. However, like our parents, the way how we grew up, this is what they are telling us. You need to respect the elders. You need to respect the neighbors. If there is something like that, this is wrong, that’s probably because it’s wrong. Come and tell us what happened as well. We want to hear your type of story. So it’s like this. This is like how it’s about. And we…

while sometimes we resented. However, like when we grew up, we appreciated. I might not like it when I was a little girl. However, right now, the reason why I’m smiling is because this is what left me who I am today. Like the only reason why this is thing is only for our goodwill, but not like for our life, not for our badwill in that sense. Yeah.

Jason Elkins (12:42.602)
yeah.

Jason Elkins (12:58.12)
Right, right. Okay. I got that. That’s very cool. What did I’m just curious? Well, is your brother older or younger? He’s younger. Okay. When did you first? What came first? Tourism or food for you? I mean, I know food in a sense, but but you know what I mean? mean, obviously you were eating food before you were starting thinking about running a tour business. But where did it start for you?

Siham Lahmine (13:05.324)
He’s younger.

Siham Lahmine (13:19.589)
I know what you mean. I know what you mean.

Siham Lahmine (13:28.812)
Yeah, I would say tourism comes first. like, yeah, through tourism, the first time that I’ve started tourism, I started it from a culinary perspective. As a local, I know my food. I never knew how travelers would appreciate what I’m doing. That’s what’s something tricky for me to understand at the beginning. I would say at the first three or four couple of tours. But the more I was leading, I was always finishing off with a little bit of feedback.

Jason Elkins (13:31.71)
Okay.

Siham Lahmine (13:58.796)
Like we travelers, as an example, let me know what did you like the most? Like what should we change? Something like that. And you were saying, we love seeing the country through food. This is a different concept while we were focusing on just like monuments, palaces, things like that, which is great. But right now we understand the country from the stories that is coming from the food. So this is why I start appreciating this the most. And I’m trying to expand it as much as possible.

Jason Elkins (14:30.654)
So what I heard you say was kind of your interest was more in tourism initially. Was it one of those things of…

Siham Lahmine (14:36.087)
Mm-hmm.

Jason Elkins (14:49.256)
Was it one of those things of, okay, I know I want to do tourism, but I’m not really sure what type of tourism. Obviously, food’s a big thing. You like food. You probably know a lot about food. was food kind of an obvious choice or did you, because it sounded like, you you were polling your guests and they talked about other things and the food was what seemed to be the most important.

I guess what I’m saying is when you decide, I’m doing tourism, I’m going to focus on food or was it I’m doing tourism, I’m not sure what to focus on. then over a period of short period of time, it just became like, food seems to be the thing that resonates the best, both with my clients and with myself.

Siham Lahmine (15:35.81)
like when I started my company, I’ve had a clear vision that it’s going to be about food mainly because that’s a passion that I grew up over the past like 12 years. However, the first time when I started in tourism that was in 2013, that’s like I started with another company. That’s when I started sometimes like doing food tours and hearing travelers feedback. But after COVID, when I decided to do something of my own, I was decisive. This is like my path.

It’s all going to be about food and concentration on the food. Of course, I have other travelers who saying, besides food, we are interested in doing this. We are interested in doing that. And that doesn’t like stop me from creating even sometimes unique experiences. Like one guest might say, I’m interested to have a private access to this other example library that I’ve heard it has been closed for almost different days. And then I will go and investigate and do a research.

Jason Elkins (16:30.506)
Mm-hmm.

Siham Lahmine (16:33.376)
and see how can I make it even go unaccepted. So those are like the cool things on the side that I do as well, but the niche of the company is culinary 100%.

Jason Elkins (16:46.138)
Anybody that is listening, this is going to be on video as well. So if you’re listening to this on a podcast player, a traditional audio podcast, you need to go over and see this on video as well because

the smile on your face, see him is just like you are so so passionate about this. I’m just feel so pleasure and honored to be able to see see your face on the screen because you’ve got me excited. I’m like and this happened the first time we had a conversation. I was like, my gosh, I gotta go. I gotta go. I don’t know what she’s talking about, but I gotta go. which is which is super super cool.

Siham Lahmine (17:18.292)
You

Thank you.

Jason Elkins (17:24.244)
But I really though, I want to understand, because you said kind of the tourism started it and then the food, but then you said, but I always was always into food. So I really like when you were young, what’s your first memory of either an interest in food, not just being hungry, you know, because I, we all have those memories. Well, some of us do anyway. Your first memory of, ooh, I think I really am interested in food.

Siham Lahmine (17:43.544)
Yeah.

Jason Elkins (17:54.66)
or your first memory and, ooh, I think I’m interested in tourism. Which one of those two things, which one of those two memories is oldest?

Siham Lahmine (18:04.728)
say food 100%. Like if you know Moroccans, yeah, if you know Moroccans, like we are all foodies. This is who we are. Like we love our food. We’re very particular about what we’re eating. We take four meals during the day. That’s how food is important for us. Food like has always been a thing for me. Let me just clarify like the way how I try to explain it.

Jason Elkins (18:06.94)
Okay, let’s dig into that then.

Jason Elkins (18:20.977)
Mm-hmm. Uh-huh.

Siham Lahmine (18:30.348)
I mean, as I said, like I am a local, I love my food and I love the stories that I told from my food. I just never like realized that the travelers will appreciate hearing the stories as much as I knew when I lived those tours and I heard them like from them directly. this is like, we love this, we love knowing this. This is what grows this passion more into me. okay, then like they appreciate what I’m doing.

So that grows more confidence in what I’m doing and just like continuing into this path.

Jason Elkins (19:03.274)
All right, very cool. So were your parents, was your mom into cooking? Do you have memories shared with her or grandparents or other people in your life? tell us, I just want to hear more about the food connection.

Siham Lahmine (19:09.217)
My name is John.

Siham Lahmine (19:19.158)
Absolutely. I would say everyone basically. My grandparents from my father’s side, they loved food whenever we were going there and celebrating. Yeah, they loved food. Whenever we were going there. Yeah, and celebrating. The only word that you will hear throughout the day is cool, cool, which means eat, eat. And you know how grandmothers love to suffer. You need to eat. It’s not like it’s a choice. It’s something that is obligatory.

Jason Elkins (19:28.506)
Everybody in Morocco, I think, right? Yeah. Silly question, isn’t it?

Siham Lahmine (19:49.166)
So like sometimes I might be taking a nap and I’ll be waking up just to have some tasty because sometimes it’s on the table. That’s how food is like, that’s how we express our love basically. It’s through feeding people. Also like my mother, like she was like to cook and I loved her cooking. She’s still doing the same thing. I mean like her kitchen is her kingdom. Nobody is allowed to go inside. Even my brother.

Jason Elkins (20:15.047)
Mmm.

Siham Lahmine (20:16.204)
Like when my brother took over and went to Germany, like he starts cooking for himself, doing like new dishes. So the moment he come back, he’s literally not allowed to go inside the kitchen. Even if he wants something to cook for himself. It’s my mom’s fault.

Jason Elkins (20:29.418)
All right, so that poses a good question because based on what you just said about like it’s mom’s kitchen, nobody’s allowed in mom’s kitchen. But did that mean you weren’t able to go in there and cook with her?

Siham Lahmine (20:34.476)
Yeah.

Siham Lahmine (20:46.38)
I’ve actually learned by seeing, not by cooking. That’s how I’ve learned.

Jason Elkins (20:49.79)
from like standing outside the door looking in peeking into the kitchen and just watching her. that right?

Siham Lahmine (20:56.504)
That’s actually right. mean, other mothers, I would say they’re engaging their daughters into the kitchen. My mother’s vision or viewing of me is that she wanted me to accomplish what she couldn’t. So like she wanted me to finish my university degree. Why she couldn’t do that. She wanted me to focus on my career because this was her dream. She’s saying, I’m seeing my dreams like happening through you. And like, if I need to support that through making food.

Jason Elkins (20:58.228)
Is that?

Siham Lahmine (21:25.804)
Like making you feel comfortable, I’ll do whatever it takes. I just want you to accomplish the things that I couldn’t. So like when I’m trying to learn, like I’m not allowed inside. So what I do, I try to see, I watch sometimes even YouTube, I watch my grandmother, like right now she passed away, but I used to watch her like how she cooks traditionally and all of that. And like when she is traveling, that’s the time for me when I go into the kitchen and do my thing.

Jason Elkins (21:54.433)
So, so what I’m envisioning is a, I don’t know, Thursday evening at your house when you were a kid and mom’s in the kitchen cooking and you’re like, mom, can I come in and see what you’re doing? Can I come in and help? And she’s like, no, you need to sit down and do your schoolwork. You need to sit down and study and.

Siham Lahmine (22:13.047)
Yeah.

Jason Elkins (22:16.374)
I will, I’m doing this because that was her way of making it easy for you to sit down and study was she was going to take care of the food and all that stuff. And she was, is that kind of what it was like?

Siham Lahmine (22:26.882)
Yeah, exactly. Like you are describing it like perfectly. I like whenever I have exams, it’s more about like sitting and like, I would say working out my exams. And she used to test me as well. Like I will give her like what my exam will be on the following day. And then she’ll take over my like my workbook and then start asking me questions to see like how I am how much I have knowledge.

to take that exam on the following day. That’s how she was particular and I’m very grateful for her. Not just me, me and my brother. Because without her, I would say I wouldn’t reach that far. There will be other things stopping me on the way. She makes life easier for us. And also my dad, he was the one who were saying, never worry about finances in terms of study. If you need a tutor, if you need this, I’m gonna finance you.

Just let me know, while we didn’t even ask him for that. Like we wanted to be responsible on our own studies and just work ourselves without the need of asking him anything. But he will say, don’t ask me for other things, ask me for things that are relevant. And that’s like your school. So never be intimidated of asking me about that.

Jason Elkins (23:46.15)
Okay, someone is listening to this right now that grew up in a family maybe that sounds similar to yours and they’re having flashbacks thinking of the pressure that they faced as a child because mom did everything to make sure that I had time to study. Dad did everything to make sure that I had the resources to go to school once I got

selected and accepted. And they’re thinking, my gosh, the pressure was horrible. And it’s not what I wanted. And I did everything I did to make my parents happy. I’m not saying that you’re thinking that I’m not. I’m not even going to ask you because you know, you’ve got family that might listen to this someday. But I suspect that I suspect I suspect there’s is that common in Morocco to have that kind of

Siham Lahmine (24:33.87)
Yeah.

Jason Elkins (24:43.902)
family situation where the parents work really, really hard so their kids can stay focused on school and studies, or was your family a little different?

Siham Lahmine (24:53.582)
No, I would say my family was a little different. That’s what I would say. probably because the way how they grew up, it’s different. Like, came from the countryside, both of them, both my mom and my dad. And my grandmother, oh, like, who passed away, and I loved her, like, so much. The way, like, even though she was never outside home, she is the one who will stay inside home and look after her kids and all of that.

She supported every kid of her to go and continue and pursue their studies. That’s how she led them. That’s what actually enabled them to do the same with their kids. Coming from the countryside, it’s a different life. That means that you need to look after the land, as an example. You need to look after us when we grow up, which actually all of my family did. However, it’s not like sending your kids to other cities to study or even to other countries to study.

So this is how my grandmother was seeing things. So she send my father to FEDS. That’s where he studied. And that’s where he got his degree and all of that. And that’s where he was hired here in FEDS. And my mother, like the grandmother of my mother, she actually sent her to FEDS to study. She just studied until university first year, then she got married. And because she couldn’t continue, like she set this goal that I need my daughter to take that like P.A.

like at university. I was about to start from university and taking my BA and I wanted to do something different like go abroad, continue my studies and she didn’t ever let me. She said no, the BA is my dream so you’re getting that for me and I got that for her.

Jason Elkins (26:21.909)
huh.

Jason Elkins (26:40.84)
No pressure.

Siham Lahmine (26:41.91)
No, no, no pressure. Honestly, like I’ve never considered it as a pressure. Like I was like just thinking my parents are still alive from a different perspective. Like they wanted something from me and it’s not something that I would say it’s not going to build my personality or it’s not going to help me like to grow up or it’s going to stop me from that. Like they didn’t limit my choices or options, but they wanted me to accomplish a couple of things, which I did.

And at the same time, they have inside my freedom. Like I was like by the time that I was at university, I could have traveled on my own. While like traveling on my own as part of our family, like you need to travel with someone, like not as a photo. This is like the concept here in Morocco. And you were supporting like every choice I was doing except for studies. That’s the only thing. But I mean like in terms of studies, it’s for my good sake.

Jason Elkins (27:25.674)
Mm-hmm.

Siham Lahmine (27:39.094)
And it was for my good sake. Look where I am today. So I am so grateful about what they’ve done to me. All for me.

Jason Elkins (27:47.178)
Very, very cool. What was, but you had some opportunities to travel overseas at some point. what, well, hang on. I’m not sure if I want to get there yet. So we talked a lot about kind of the food part, but honestly, I envisioned when we started talking about the food, I envisioned you telling stories of spending time in the kitchen with your grandmother and your mother and, making these things together.

Siham Lahmine (27:52.814)
Yeah.

Jason Elkins (28:16.948)
But it wasn’t that. And you’re still so fascinated by food. So what do you think? Help me make the connection. Because I’m missing something. And I know you know the story. I don’t. So help me make the connection between standing outside of the kitchen, looking in, trying to figure out what mom’s doing, to I’m going to have a culinary tour business.

Siham Lahmine (28:45.678)
Yeah.

Jason Elkins (28:45.994)
around food. So help me figure that out.

Siham Lahmine (28:48.524)
Yeah, so like the joy of watching your mother or your grandmother doing something, it’s something that is, I would say, just unbelievable in that sense. It doesn’t mean like that I have to contribute to feel it. The feeling comes with sitting at the table, sharing the meal together, exchanging the stories between us. That’s like where the pleasure comes the most.

The pleasure is about what the food holds in terms of memories from me. Doing it by hand doesn’t change anything. Whether I do it or not, it doesn’t change anything. What is great about it, it’s really just being with my family, eating with my family. And I’m just grateful for all of these opportunities that we’re still sharing the same table until today. And then we will be exchanging random topics, sometimes politics over food.

Sometimes we will be talking about someone as an example in our family or an incident that we feel sorry about or something that we feel happy to know. So all while we’re eating and while we’re sharing this story, all of this is fascinating. This is what creates the food stories behind it. So the storytelling for me when I’m taking people on culinary tours, it’s about sharing with them, why do we eat this?

How do we eat it? When do we eat it? What is the ritual behind it? From where it comes? So like I’m trying to to touch a lot of like things while building my story around it. And also what I’m taking them like to another family to hold them for a culinary tour, a culinary experience such as a cooking class. It’s more about knowing the family itself and how they are living their lives and how they are sharing food and who was helping inside the kitchen and who wasn’t.

Jason Elkins (30:23.486)
Mm-hmm.

Siham Lahmine (30:43.744)
and whether men are helping or not, or what the men are doing as part of their daily task. So I’m answering all of these questions for the curiosity of travelers. So this is why I’m fascinated. feel like, I just don’t feel, I trust that the food has a huge connection into the person, like personality. Through food, you can understand the person, how they are viewing food, how they are eating, how they are loving it.

and what does that food even represent? That’s how you break that bridge of the culture and connect mostly like with the locals.

Jason Elkins (31:20.042)
All right, wow. Are you familiar with the five love languages? There’s a concept, the five love languages, a guy named Robert Chapman, I’m not sure his first name, but he wrote a book about the five love languages and it’s how we feel love. And usually that’s also how we display love. So your mother’s love language for you, just based on this conversation. I don’t know, I could be way off.

Siham Lahmine (31:25.71)
Which one?

Siham Lahmine (31:37.869)
Yeah.

Jason Elkins (31:46.74)
but it’s acts of service is one of them. That’s one of the ways that we show love and we feel love. So her being in the kitchen, making the food, taking care of that part of it for you so that you could go to school, study, whatever, that was her way of showing love to you. Probably maybe, I don’t know, if I were to guess, I’d say it’s probably a way that you feel loved is by that.

So you’ve got a strong connection to the culinary part right there because you probably feel loved when someone’s making food for you. I don’t know. I’m just guessing. I would, I would. and the other thing that’s fascinating though is like in a, a sense, I envision you kind of, I don’t know if spectator is the right word, but sometimes tourists are, we want to go places and see things and experience things.

Siham Lahmine (32:24.078)
Yeah, no, no, you’re right. You’re right.

Jason Elkins (32:43.496)
We may not get in the kitchen and get our hands dirty, but we want to understand it. We want to watch it. We want to see it happen. We want to hear about it. We want to learn about it. So almost you as a young child, standing outside of the kitchen, watching mom in there, doing this act of love and then bringing it to the table and you receiving it as an act of love. It kind of makes sense that you’re doing this kind of work. I don’t know.

You’ve probably thought all this stuff out. It’s just like my brain just catching on.

Siham Lahmine (33:08.233)
Totally.

Siham Lahmine (33:13.012)
Jason actually like totally like we express our love as a country like through food like we’re not a country as an example like when we meet someone we will express our emotion I would say boldly in that sense I’m not gonna meet someone and I say I miss you so much I love you and then hug them and all of that yeah love is expressed like through food so whenever like we have guests coming in

Jason Elkins (33:34.858)
Let’s eat.

Siham Lahmine (33:42.838)
what we are putting on the table that shows like how much we love them, how much we care about them. And I don’t mean that we need to put expensive things or we need to make expensive things. It’s all about like a food that is coming from our stories of childhood or like a food that is like shared and that is a heritage like signature dish of that place that we are preparing uniquely for these girls who are coming from another city and to taste it. I would say.

or today because you come to fast, I’m making you pastilla. Like pastilla, that means this is the signature dish of fast. So for them, that’s something fascinating. It’s not eaten every day. So it’s something that is what served because we love them. So instantly, like that guest or that local guest understands without the need of the words that they are loved and they are being valued. So that’s what it means. Yeah.

Jason Elkins (34:35.09)
All right, so here’s the question. Never thought of this question before, but I heard you say it doesn’t have to be expensive or fancy. And I started to visualize. OK, so maybe a good example is, I don’t know, lobster dinner in the Northeast. So maybe if I’ve got a guest and I want to show off, I might buy a bunch of lobster and steak and lobster and it’s kind of expensive, but.

it’s considered good. Or there might be a dish that’s much cheaper, but it takes three times as long to make it. So there might be a dish that’s like this, I gotta get up early in the morning, like Thanksgiving dinner in the US would be maybe a good example of. Thanksgiving is always so complicated. Nothing on the table is particularly expensive. It’s…

turkey and stuffing and green beans and the typical traditional American Thanksgiving dinner. But you got to get up, you got to get the turkey and you got to thaw the turkey for three days and then you got to wake up at six in the morning and start working and maybe everything’s ready and on the table by six o’clock in the evening. So it’s not a terribly expensive assortment of foods, but it’s very, very time consuming. I’m imagining

Siham Lahmine (35:54.22)
Yeah.

Jason Elkins (35:59.241)
Maybe in Morocco, it’s like, no, it doesn’t have to be the expensive stuff, but I’m going to make you something that takes a lot of time and a lot of effort. And it might just be handmade couscous or something, you know, that’s not super fancy, but there’s a lot of time and effort put into it. Does that happen?

Siham Lahmine (36:05.528)
Yeah. Yeah.

Siham Lahmine (36:18.774)
Yeah, it does happen. I mean, I would say each family has its way of doing things. So there are always exceptions, Jason, because I know that some Moroccans will be like watching your episode as well. So I want to include everyone into the picture. Like some are saying, like, let me do something expensive. While I mean mostly like of us, the way how we think it’s about creating something that is like unique.

The other guests like that coming from another city doesn’t have the option to eat it except when it’s made of our home, like home cooked meal, not just like buying something and putting it on the table. That’s also important and also time consuming in this case. Because all of our food is slow cooked food. So it takes a while to prepare it. Pastilla is six hours. So it’s not something that is prepared quickly. Couscous, normally our couscous is three hours.

because it’s steamed for three times. It’s not like instantly made couscous with hot water. So it’s different here in Morocco. No, no, no, right? So that’s not it. And also like there are women from the countryside, including from where I came, who make couscous from scratch, couscous rolling. So they’re making their own couscous. They just don’t buy it from store. And also like when we’re talking about Tajin, same thing.

Jason Elkins (37:19.55)
Mm-hmm.

Not like the stuff we buy at the grocery store in the US that says couscous on the side of the box. It’s not like that.

Siham Lahmine (37:45.696)
It’s not instant made pajean. It takes three hours or two hours and half depending on the meat that you are putting there. And we also always tend to make, like I would say, beautiful decoration while we’re presenting the food to the guests. And here’s how we make sure that the guests feel special. We put our lovely plates that we, as kids, are not allowed to eat of it from home. Their only place for the guests, that’s it.

Jason Elkins (38:00.81)
Mm-hmm.

Siham Lahmine (38:14.934)
And we have one unique plate that is peacock. And this peacock plate is actually passed on from one generation to another. As an example, my mother is saying, the moment when you have your own home, this is just as an example, in the future, I’m gonna give you this plate. This is my heritage to you. So we have a plate that has the peacock sign, and it used to be like expensive by the time of my grandparents and my mother. So that’s why it’s still holding that unique or that.

special touch. So like that was only served to the guests. It’s not something that we’re eating at it every day. Also, I would say the place where the guests are sitting, like once you go inside the family home, here is one thing. The place when you see a TV, that’s where the family garden. That’s not for guests. That’s only for us where to sit. We have another salon mainly for guests. We as kids, and even for me right now as another, I’m not allowed to go inside the salon.

Jason Elkins (38:46.004)
Did you?

Siham Lahmine (39:13.44)
Even though I am allowed right now, but this is how I grew up. I don’t go there because that’s in my nature. That place is basically for guests where they’re going to sit, eat and sleep. So that’s how it is. It’s always tidy. It’s always fancy and it’s always clean because we’re always expecting guests to come.

Jason Elkins (39:29.513)
Mm-hmm.

I love that. A couple of things. You mentioned the plate. I think I heard you say peacock, like the bird with all the big bright feathers. Okay. So is that just a particular plate that your family has or does like every family have a peacock plate?

Siham Lahmine (39:39.055)
People, yeah, it’s like a peacock’s fire. Like the birds.

Siham Lahmine (39:50.254)
Many families in Morocco, I’m not going to use all because I don’t know everything. But many families in Morocco have the peacock plate. I think because it was fancy and expensive at that time. Right now it’s not. But I mean, it’s because it was fancy and just unique, new, a new design for Morocco because we have tiles, we have different designs.

Jason Elkins (39:54.002)
Well, yeah. Okay. it’s all right.

Jason Elkins (40:00.681)
Where did that come from?

Siham Lahmine (40:18.296)
but we don’t have peacock as a bird into the plane. The moment families, yeah.

Jason Elkins (40:21.802)
So the first time those became available in Morocco, everybody went and bought one. And then it just became tradition to hand it down through the family.

Siham Lahmine (40:28.43)
Yeah.

Siham Lahmine (40:31.758)
Yeah.

Siham Lahmine (40:35.502)
And passed on even, passed on even from one generation to another. That’s like how it was. So it’s something that is culturally, I would say, unique or close to our families.

Jason Elkins (40:50.506)
Now, is this the plate that you would maybe pile a bunch of couscous and tagine meat and stuff like that on this big plate and then serve it as a, it was kind of a, I don’t know, a family style, you just put the plate out there and everybody eats from that plate or what is that? Is that the?

Siham Lahmine (41:08.418)
Yeah, like you can serve whichever you want on it basically, but mostly like for guests mostly. I would say for guests Like, however, as an example, like for couscous, like the way what is recommended how to serve it, there is like a clay, like a plate that is similar to the tagine, but it’s not because it doesn’t have the lid And we call it qata, that’s the name of it.

Jason Elkins (41:16.222)
Right, I got that, yeah.

Jason Elkins (41:34.409)
Mm-hmm.

Siham Lahmine (41:37.112)
So this is where we typically serve our couscous. But if you want to even serve it in that peacock plate, you can do that because it’s normally round and big. And it’s also like, it’s also like, would say, have some space underneath so you can put your couscous in it. It’s not like flat.

Jason Elkins (41:55.637)
Did you ever, I was imagining maybe you were a young Moroccan girl or boy pretending that they’re cooking and they get a hold of the peacock plate and they’re pretending to do a tea party or pretending, you better not.

Siham Lahmine (42:13.868)
Never. Never did. That’s not a game. no, no, no. At long the peacock place were always like put at a higher like place in the cupboard. So we not like reach it out.

Jason Elkins (42:20.638)
Do not touch the peacock plate is what I write.

Jason Elkins (42:29.277)
Uh-huh.

So if your mom came around the corner and you’re seven years old sitting in the kitchen on the floor with the peacock plate, making mud, making mud, mud cookies and stacking them on the peacock plate. That’s probably going to be the last time you do that. Right.

Siham Lahmine (42:41.474)
I am a proper, yeah.

Siham Lahmine (42:48.244)
Yeah, probably like, not even have the chance to do that. That’s just only like, the last time to do that. Yeah.

Jason Elkins (42:52.168)
Yeah, okay. Just, just doesn’t happen. Did you, did you pretend that you were cooking? I mean, a lot of, a lot of kids do that when they’re young, they kind of, you know, make believe they’ve, you know, they even Barbie in the, in the States, they had like the, the Barbie kitchen and the, what was that little like, it was like an oven.

I wish I could remember this because my daughter wanted one so bad that we went and got her one, but it’s like an oven that you put light bulbs in and you can actually make cookies in this little plastic oven. So I guess where I’m going with that is a lot of kids would pretend they were cooking. Did you do that when you were young?

Siham Lahmine (43:29.762)
Yeah, like, luckily, like I grew up with two lovely girls, like in the same apartment where I was born to live. And we were almost the same age. was one year older than me and one was like four years younger than me. So we were all like gathered in the apartment stairs and sit with the blankets. And then we used to play all together.

Jason Elkins (43:39.273)
Mm-hmm.

Jason Elkins (43:54.282)
Mm-hmm.

Siham Lahmine (43:59.296)
or sometimes in the roof terrace of the apartment. It will be like couple doors and then like they are responsible of their home cooking. I’m serving you cookies with tea. I’m serving you cookies with coffee. here is the dish that I prepared today. What did you prepare today? What are you bringing today? these games we used to play them, all of them.

Jason Elkins (44:02.186)
Mm-hmm.

Jason Elkins (44:19.338)
All right, I just, I remembered it’s called the Easy Bake Oven. Did you have one of those? Do you remember that? Never heard of that? No, no, okay. Anyway, you feel like you had to hide that type of play from your mom if she saw you playing with the other girls that you were cooking? Did you feel like, ooh, mom’s not gonna like that? I’m just curious.

Siham Lahmine (44:24.844)
That’s not the thing, no, no, no, no, no.

Siham Lahmine (44:42.89)
No, no, because like at that time I knew that I was like just playing with the girls. So like my mom, she’s not like, she’s not against me like learning to cook. It’s not the case. It’s more about wanting me to focus on my studies the most. That’s like her own objective. Maybe if she was saying, if you go near to the kitchen, then this is what’s gonna happen to you. You’re not allowed to cook or things like that. I’ll be scared. But she always like to make sure to

Jason Elkins (44:49.31)
Mm-hmm.

Jason Elkins (45:00.435)
Yeah.

Siham Lahmine (45:12.354)
But the reason why she’s doing that, she’s doing it for a good reason. Just like for me to focus on my studies. That’s all. Yeah.

Jason Elkins (45:20.266)
Makes sense. it any point you worked in a kitchen or a restaurant or had any desire to?

Siham Lahmine (45:29.506)
Well, mean, all my work is in food right now.

Jason Elkins (45:31.914)
Well, I knew you were going to say that. I get that. But you know what I’m asking you? Have you not, I know you’ve worked in restaurants with your clients as you’re showing them and sitting down with them and explaining what’s going on. get that. But as far as, food production, making food.

Siham Lahmine (45:36.717)
I don’t

Siham Lahmine (45:49.56)
Yeah. Yeah.

Jason Elkins (45:52.692)
for a living.

Siham Lahmine (45:55.47)
The first job that I’ve ever done was Peace Corps. That’s the first job. My first job was teaching Americans or making Americans have access to my country. we all win. This was my first time doing this. So that was my bold move. After Rice Arthur University, I signed up for Peace Corps. then actually it took me a while to be accepted.

Jason Elkins (46:01.692)
Interesting. Okay.

Siham Lahmine (46:23.842)
Because everything was new for me. I went to another city. I started to become responsible of myself. There is no mother or father with me and they allow me to do that as well. So like it was almost two months of training and then going through exams in order to be eligible to become language and cultural facilitator with them. And as I have passed, like actually luckily I have passed and I took this step. I took five Americans to a village.

Jason Elkins (46:33.597)
Mm-hmm

Siham Lahmine (46:51.598)
It’s close to fast, but it’s two hours drive from here. So like I took them to a village. I lived with a family of my own for three months and they lived with different families. So each one lived with another family and I was teaching them every day except Sunday from eight until six PM, eight to 12, two to six PM. And it was all about our rituals, that we’re using, academic language.

And also like what you should ask in terms of food, in terms of like how to make grocery. There was only a market once a week. So I took them the first time there to understand how the weekly market happened and what they need to consider. And from there, they were starting to take that right on their own. So it was three months that I finished. And then when I was back, I started in tourism. And actually in tourism, I’ve done like different things with the first company.

I worked as a waiter actually. I’ve hosted the Roman picnics at Volibear’s. So I was explaining to them about the Romans and the food and all of that. And I learned how to wipe even glasses, make them look shiny, where the knife needs to be, where the fork, where the glass needs to be put. All of these etiquette that it was new for me, but I was excited. The more I was doing this, it wasn’t…

Jason Elkins (47:50.41)
Okay?

Jason Elkins (48:12.436)
Mm-hmm.

Siham Lahmine (48:15.232)
It wasn’t a challenge for me. It was an excitement that this is like access to what I wanted to do basically. And this is how I start like doing it. When my mom, sometimes I’m bringing gifts even to my family home to meet her and I’ve started talking about food. And when my mom is listening to me because she got some English, she come and say to me, my God, like you speak like a chef. Like if people hear you, they will think that you are excellent in cooking, but you don’t even go to the kitchen. I said, sir, thanks to your love.

So we’re always joking in front of truckers and I explain to them what’s going on and this is what my mom and this is her vision. So all of this story, they got it like through like as well.

Jason Elkins (48:56.852)
Very, very cool. I think we need to, if you don’t mind, I’d like to go back and explore the Peace Corps thing a little bit. I’m gonna share with you what I think I heard was that you finished school, you wanted to work for the Peace Corps, you went through a process, you got accepted to work for the Peace Corps. And the role that you had, sounds like your job was to make sure that other Peace Corps people that came from other countries into Morocco,

Siham Lahmine (49:03.84)
Yeah. OK.

Siham Lahmine (49:13.87)
See ya.

Jason Elkins (49:27.166)
were able to do their jobs, whatever their jobs were effectively. So your job was to make, to kind of help integrate them into the community and help them figure out how they could help the people in the community. So you were like a liaison in a sense, right? Which is interesting because it never occurred to me that that makes perfect sense. I’ve always heard of peace. You you joined the Peace Corps, you go to another country. You joined the Peace Corps and worked in your country.

Siham Lahmine (49:56.75)
Yes, I’ve worked in my country. So normally, all the Peace Corps volunteers who came to Morocco are from the USA. So they are all from the USA. And the reason why I was responsible for them for the three months is to enable them to live in the country for the next two years and knowing what the country is about, what is our culture, what is our words, how to communicate, what is the etiquette.

Jason Elkins (49:56.937)
to help other, that’s cool.

Siham Lahmine (50:26.802)
how to understand the differences between Morocco as a country and the USA as a country because that’s important. Sometimes what are the words that are for you are okay to say but here you mean something different.

Jason Elkins (50:41.93)
It sounds like an amazing job to help prepare you for the tourism business. But you also mentioned the word fallen.

Siham Lahmine (50:49.102)
At that stage, I wasn’t even considering tourism. So it was just like teaching because everyone who knew me, including my neighbors, including my family, since I was, I would say, four or five years old, they were saying, Siham, you are a teacher. You were calling me teacher, Siham. So everyone was preparing me mentally to become a teacher.

Jason Elkins (51:16.105)
Mm-hmm.

Siham Lahmine (51:16.49)
And here I am, like I went to a completely different life path that has nothing to do with their expectation or the expectation of the community.

Jason Elkins (51:26.354)
Well, what was what did you get your degree in? I don’t think you mentioned that.

Siham Lahmine (51:31.278)
I had BA at university in English. I specialize in linguistics.

Jason Elkins (51:38.409)
In linguistics, okay. So you mentioned teaching. Oftentimes on this show, I’ve had conversations with tour guides, tour operators, just tourism professionals. say, look, if you were gonna hire someone that had no tourism experience, but let’s say you needed some new guides or trip leaders and you had to hire somebody who’s never worked in tourism.

What industry would you go to? Would you look for, you know, would you go to look for people that could, that you could bring them into tourism with the least amount of training and have them up and ready to go? I don’t know if I’m being clear on that, but, what keeps coming up is, is teachers and bartenders. Teachers and bartenders. If I had to create a guide staff and I would go look for teachers and bartenders, cause both of them,

are just good at taking care of people and leading a small group and keeping everybody kind of engaged and interested and moving towards the same goals. Would you agree?

Siham Lahmine (52:48.334)
I would agree with this. also, normally the way I’m seeing someone to bring the mule to my company and work with them, it’s always people who are passionate about taking English as a language because they like it, they love it. That’s the first thing. And also the second thing is because they have zero expertise in tourism. That’s the second thing. I don’t mind training someone from scratch. I love that.

And I’ve trained so many people. fact, along my journey, I would say tens and tens. That’s like the kind of amount of people who are like trained. And I’ve realized the ones who are coming with degree in tourism, they’re always thinking that they know the best, while actually like they’re not, don’t know, but there are other things in their like personality that needs more working on.

Like if someone come in with a bright personality and they have English, they can manage tourism brilliantly. But when people think they have that ego that we know, that means that that ego will stop them on the way. Because this is an industry that’s changing every single day. We’re talking today and here is the AI happening. We’re going to talk tomorrow and here is another thing that’s going to come. So like you always need to have that open perspective that this is a changing domain.

Jason Elkins (53:51.134)
Hmm?

Siham Lahmine (54:12.846)
and you need to be adaptable to it and like accepting it. It’s okay to have like this new thing. While I mean, for people who are coming with tourism degree, like they were like always, oh yeah, but this is this way. Yeah, this is this way. I agree. But there is always exception because we’re not working into a world that is going to say one plus one equal to, sometimes one plus one could equal 10. Because if I’m going to add a zero, who knows? Like that’s what’s going to happen.

Jason Elkins (54:38.132)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It’s, it’s interesting. Cause I think like best case scenario is maybe you find somebody who I’m going to say bartender again. I don’t know why I just, had a conversation recently with the bartender was

Siham Lahmine (54:51.758)
Yeah, no, no, I love that. I mean, we don’t have like bartenders. That’s why like I’m not putting that I’m not like resonating with this picture the most. But I’m going to say when you’re saying teachers, that resonates with me a lot. yeah, I get that. Like if someone who’s people who like listen to what they want and also accept them like during like when they are grumpy or things like that. So maybe that’s why you’re using like bartender.

Jason Elkins (55:04.083)
Yeah, yeah.

Jason Elkins (55:18.878)
Yeah, and maybe it’s kind of the stereotype is like a good bartender can be really busy with a lot of different things going on. And yet every single person that walks up to him needs to feel seen, sometimes heard, respected.

But at the same time, when someone goes too far, that bartender needs to step in and kind of redirect and maybe even cut them off, ask them to leave, whatever, but all in a way that everybody in the room feels seen and heard, which is pretty much the way you would describe a good tour guide, right? So if you could take a good bartender who’s tending bar to pay his way through tourism school.

Siham Lahmine (55:49.838)
I love those. Yeah, I love those, mostly.

Siham Lahmine (56:03.948)
Yeah. Yeah.

Jason Elkins (56:05.512)
Right? So he’s got four years of tendon bar and juggling his schoolwork and gets a degree in tourism and he was a bartender or a teacher. You know, I mean, either way, that’s gonna be a lot better than maybe someone with a master’s degree in international tourism that frankly…

know if you have if you pay tuition and you go to class and you pass your tests you can get a degree in anything doesn’t necessarily mean you’re going to be the best tour guide or tour operator or you know whatever so

Siham Lahmine (56:37.934)
Yeah. Yeah.

Siham Lahmine (56:46.168)
Yeah, mean like opportunities need to be equal. And like, it doesn’t mean that someone like if someone came and then say to me, hey, like as an example, I have this degree in tourism and I’m not having great personality. That’s not good for my business. That’s not even good for me because I’m not gonna be able to manage my business the way I want to. And if someone came to me with zero expertise, but just great personality.

I’d be encouraged to invest my time, my energy and everything into that person. Why? Because he’s like open to everything. And I might like, I will, I’m not, just might. I will learn a lot of things because sometimes like people come in with this creative idea, why not doing this instead of doing that? So that’s actually like great. And the same thing, if someone came to me like with as an example, a degree in tourism and a bright personality, why not?

Jason Elkins (57:22.76)
Mm-hmm.

Siham Lahmine (57:43.414)
Like both are standing equal. What I’m trying to share is that like we never say that we know everything. That’s one of the things like the world of tourism is changing massively and also like great personalities always shine into the tourism industry because we are people to people, not people like the computer or people to phone or like people to statistics. We are truly like people to people. This is like the domain.

Jason Elkins (58:02.164)
Yeah.

Jason Elkins (58:11.868)
If one of your nieces or nephews came to you and says, wanna do what you’re doing. I wanna get involved in tourism. And they’re considering going to school to get a degree in tourism. They’ve never worked in tourism. They’re finishing high school. They’ve never had a job. And they’re like,

Siham Lahmine (58:16.6)
Yeah.

Siham Lahmine (58:34.83)
Okay.

Jason Elkins (58:38.952)
You know, on Siham I’m going to, I want to go to school for tourism for the next four years so I can get a degree and work in tourism like you do. What advice would you give them? Is there anything immediately that pops into your head as what you would suggest they do first before they start school, before they pay their tuition?

Siham Lahmine (58:47.342)
Yeah.

Siham Lahmine (58:58.83)
Nothing comes to my mind. I’m just going to say, don’t be afraid, do it. That’s all I’m going to say. Yeah, yeah, will encourage it. That’s what I’m going to say. But in terms of giving particular advice, it will depend on the ride while they are taking that school. Maybe if they come to me with a challenge that they face, that’s what I’m going to offer.

Jason Elkins (59:07.302)
Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Very cool.

Siham Lahmine (59:27.66)
like advice and guidance if I know what to.

Jason Elkins (59:31.284)
What if, if, what if, what if you know their personality is not that great?

Siham Lahmine (59:36.824)
But then I’m going to be honest with them. Like that’s what I’m going to be. yeah, yeah. it’s like, I’m actually like, I’ve had so many friends and so many like neighbors and my community is huge.

Jason Elkins (59:38.602)
Okay, I love that.

Jason Elkins (59:53.362)
Remember, some of them might listen to this before you go any further.

Siham Lahmine (59:56.942)
And like when they come to me and just ask for my guidance I’m always saying like like what are you thinking this job with will entail? That’s the first thing like it will entail this with do you feel capable of doing that? So like just few questions I might not come direct to them and say no you’re not good enough for that because who knows they might be great at that it’s not my call

But it’s more about like asking them questions for them to think deeper about their choice from the beginning. And I just had a situation with one of my neighbors, daughter, and she actually like she’s right now 21, 20 years old. She got like her university degree, and she wanted to go into pharmacy, everyone was opposing her. And that’s pharmacy, sorry, she wants to be a nerd. Everyone was opposing her and saying, no, why you’re doing it.

and all of that and then she just came and sit with me and I said, why do you want to do it? And she said, look, I want to really like assist people. I want to become a nurse because I want to assist people. I feel that this is a noble job and I want to do something noble as part of my career. I told her it’s going to be in French. Are you like, are you ready to continue like you’re studying in French? She said, I don’t mind even though I will have classes. This is how committed. Then I took her to a private school and we asked about like, like a

The intuition sees all of that and then I spoke with her parents and she got admitted and right now she is on her third year and guess what? is loving it because this is who she is. Maybe if she comes to me and says, I’m gonna say what you’re gonna do with the language. You need to know English as an example. You need to do this like this. You need to be working. It’s 24 hours job. Like it’s these questions. Like you need to stay alert.

Jason Elkins (01:01:32.637)
Nice.

Siham Lahmine (01:01:51.17)
Sometimes a traveler might like talk to you at 3 a.m. and your needs to be on and you need to be ready. What an emergency happened, how would you handle it? Like these are the questions that someone needs to ask themselves because putting themselves into this life. Are you ready for all of this? If they are, why not?

Jason Elkins (01:02:10.686)
I think that’s really, really good advice and a good way to approach it because a lot of young people may think of, work in tourism. mean, honestly, it’s kind of that Instagram thing, right? They’re seeing travelers do awesome, awesome stuff, influencers. And sometimes influencers will come in, come on and say, I work in the travel business and whatever.

so that’s kind of all you see. don’t see those late night calls or Friday night when you’re out with your spouse for dinner and you’ve got a babysitter taking care of the kids. then you get the call from a client that’s in an airport halfway around the world saying, you know, our driver’s not here, you know, or whatever. And of course, yeah, or, whatever, whatever stuff comes up or even leading trips and.

Siham Lahmine (01:02:54.944)
Yeah, my fly’s got the taste. Yeah, I love it, yeah.

Jason Elkins (01:03:03.69)
You’re with them from before sunup to way past sundown. And I was going to suggest to someone, came to me and said, I’m thinking about doing this. I’d say, before you pay for four years of college to work in tourism, you really ought to try and find a job as an apprentice guide or a guide assistant or live aboard on.

Siham Lahmine (01:03:18.35)
Yeah.

Jason Elkins (01:03:29.638)
or like live live aboard staff member on one of the small ships or something just go do something and decide if you still like people after you know your three month summer with tourists and decide do i still like people and if you do then maybe it’s right

Siham Lahmine (01:03:38.478)
Yeah.

Siham Lahmine (01:03:45.56)
No, no, it’s not like what I’m doing. It’s just really how I see myself. I mean, like the moment I started into this, like I knew like it has been not a challenge in that sense, but it has something different, like for a woman, like I would say, like points of view, because sometimes I had this late night working until 12 a.m., like midnight and I’m still in the office working.

And sometimes I get my brother coming and picking me up right from the office because going outside at night and taking a taxi and the streets are empty. Even my family like were intimidated that they said for your safety, we’re like, your brother is going to come and pick you up. So like, and it’s still like, this is a job that I choose for passion for love. It’s not like for its difficulties or challenges. And I’m still doing it with the same level of love and passion.

Jason Elkins (01:04:28.554)
Mm-hmm.

Siham Lahmine (01:04:40.322)
Nothing will ever change because it has been 12 years already. So you can imagine like holding this passion all of this year. That literally means something. I’m doing something that I’m loving. But for someone else like experience it before taking the step just experience it and know where you are putting your feet. Because a lot of like women will say like we would like to get married and have our boundaries. I sacrifice marriage already.

I didn’t take marriage as my goal in life because if I was married, I’m not going to be doing what I’m doing. Especially that we’re talking about different cultures. in Europe, USA or other countries, men don’t support their women in like tourism and the active. Like sometimes you get this late night calls from male guides, all of that. Here, nobody like will understand or observe that. So I just decided that like, I’m not going to change my culture.

like immediately or instantly, I know that. So for me, best like for my sake, not to even think about marriage, because even someone who will say, it’s okay, I can accept that, but his family won’t. And I know that in our country, we marry the family more than the man himself. That’s how the marriage like work.

Jason Elkins (01:05:57.483)
I want to be careful saying this because I don’t want to say anything that is suggests suggests or implies that I think you should change your mind because I don’t. But I’m just curious.

Siham Lahmine (01:06:05.496)
Yeah.

Jason Elkins (01:06:09.834)
If you meet a guy that or a potential partner, guy, woman, whatever, it doesn’t matter. don’t care. Um, but they also work in tourism and they’re also as passionate about it as excited about it as you are. Would that change things?

Siham Lahmine (01:06:26.166)
not the same. Trust me, it’s not the same. Because I’m seeing like two guys, male and a woman who got married. And then the women always need to sacrifice part of her job, because she’s viewing as the someone who needs to look after the kids, as she needs to look after the house, as she needs to be available. That’s why I can like my time is not my time 100%.

Jason Elkins (01:06:45.162)
Jason Elkins (01:06:51.88)
Well, okay, what if you remove kids from the equation though?

Siham Lahmine (01:06:55.834)
Like you need to be responsible of the home. As I said, you are marrying the family. So whenever the family are saying we’re going to come for a visit, then you need to give them their time and not be on the phone, be on the desk, answering emails, answering phone calls. So that’s what you need to do. Yeah.

Jason Elkins (01:07:10.154)
All right. Do you okay? you’re you’re you’re destroying some of my illusions here because I’ve you know, I’m, I’m single. wasn’t single forever. But I’m, you know, been single last few years. And I keep telling myself that if I can just meet somebody that works in the tourism space that understands it that gets it and and likes to travel likes to have experiences as much as I do, then everything will work just fine. But you’re you’re making it sound like it’s just not possible.

Siham Lahmine (01:07:17.357)
Ha

Siham Lahmine (01:07:39.01)
No, no, no. Like what I’m making me say is it’s from our cultural like perspective. Really, Morocco. Like abroad, like I’m going to say this again, like abroad, like you have that understanding and that support. I’m not going to say everyone, but I mean mostly like men support the woman and women support the man’s Here, like we have family marrying the wife, not just the men marrying like the wife. So this is what we have.

Jason Elkins (01:07:39.038)
to get two people.

Jason Elkins (01:07:43.882)
Jason Elkins (01:08:00.821)
Got it.

Siham Lahmine (01:08:07.374)
So the women needs to be against her time. It’s not just like, I’m not here. I’m traveling like with my husband in this place all over the world. I’m taking phone calls. I’m doing this. Like that freedom or that luxury of freedom that it needs to happen for a woman as part of her career. And to be accepted is not 100 % accepted. Not just by the men, it’s by the family mostly. And even the men, in will be okay with that here.

Jason Elkins (01:08:28.586)
Alright.

So you need it.

Siham Lahmine (01:08:35.018)
Like later on because he’s going to hear to his family, he’s not going to be okay because we are affected the most from our approach or loved ones. So our family affects us somehow. That’s what happened.

Jason Elkins (01:08:44.217)
Huh?

Jason Elkins (01:08:47.956)
So I just heard you say it might need to be an expat, somebody that did not grow up in Morocco, doesn’t have family in Morocco, but wants to spend a lot of time in Morocco, then maybe you’d consider going on a date with him. Yeah.

Siham Lahmine (01:08:59.66)
Yeah, that’s what I would say. also like for me because I’m a Muslim, also I need to mention that I’m allowed only to marry a Muslim man. That’s another thing. like Muslim man? Yeah, well I mean like if I’ve met someone who is like all of this, Muslim man, passionate about tourism, passionate about this, and like understanding how the tourism industry works, why not?

Jason Elkins (01:09:10.12)
Yeah, yeah. So as you were saying, you put that aside so you can focus on your career.

Siham Lahmine (01:09:29.664)
But here in Morocco, I have given up this thought years ago. So I’m not even like trying or contributing or looking.

Jason Elkins (01:09:37.139)
Your list for a partner sounds just about as complicated as my list for a partner. A woman that doesn’t mind that I’m basically a homeless backpacker. When I tell people I’m a digital nomad, sometimes I’ve heard, so you’re basically homeless, a homeless backpacker, right? And I’m like, well, I don’t like to say it that way, but.

Siham Lahmine (01:09:42.956)
I did it!

Siham Lahmine (01:09:48.59)
Yeah.

Yeah.

Jason Elkins (01:09:59.465)
Yeah, so anyway, that’s okay with being a homeless backpacker. No house, no car. Everything I own is in my suitcase. She has to be willing to ride on buses and sleep in Airbnbs pretty much full-time year round. Yeah, that’s a tough list. anyway.

Siham Lahmine (01:10:14.508)
not the top list. You will miss the women’s violence and all of this.

Jason Elkins (01:10:18.738)
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So anyway, we’ve had a lot of fun. We’ve discussed a lot of topics. I know we could keep going forever. So maybe we need to come back and have some more conversations. But in the meantime, I’m curious, Siam, what did I forget to ask you? What do you wish I’d asked you? Or what do you just generally want our listeners to know about you, Morocco, Moroccan food, culture, travel?

life as a woman tour operator anything like that is what would you like our listeners to know before we wrap up

Siham Lahmine (01:10:53.954)
Yeah, I would say like Jason really went deeper into conversation and touching base on many great aspects. I think today that I’ve shared more about me, which is great. Like so people would understand like what is the role of a woman, how I grew up, what does food means to me, like what was my like my career until I got here today. So all of these are important to share. I feel this is the first time that I was like

Jason Elkins (01:11:06.12)
Mm-hmm.

Siham Lahmine (01:11:23.054)
Like I would say, I had the opportunity to go that deep in a podcast, which is great. So thank you, Jason, for that. mean, like, though there is nothing much left to say, really. I would say just come to Morocco and be part of it and enjoy it to the fullest. That’s all.

Jason Elkins (01:11:28.158)
Awesome.

Jason Elkins (01:11:41.963)
I love it, well said. And the truth is, you’re much more interesting than your list of tours that you do. I’m sure your tours are fascinating. I’m sure that the things that your clients experience are great. I’m sure that you’ve got amazing reviews and all these things, but you’re at the source or at the heart of your business. So anybody that’s listening to this.

If they feel a connection with you and I can’t imagine that they don’t, it feels like that’d be impossible. But if they feel a connection with you, they will go read itineraries. They’ll click on the link in the show notes. They’ll go to your website. If they have a desire to go to Morocco, I can’t imagine at this point in the conversation, they’re gonna reach out to you before they do anybody else. I mean, obviously they’re gonna have a good time with you. So I appreciate you going so deep into all that stuff. We didn’t spend time talking about.

Well, how do you get there? What are the entry requirements? Do you need a visa? How long can you stay? What’s the weather like? And all that stuff that you probably have a lot of those questions in a frequently asked question thing on your website. We don’t need to go into that. We went into what’s important. That’s you, your story. And thank you for sharing it with me and our listeners.

Siham Lahmine (01:12:50.744)
Yeah.

Siham Lahmine (01:13:00.398)
Thank you, Jason. Thank you also. Truly appreciate it. Yeah.

Jason Elkins (01:13:02.602)
All right, we’ll do it again real soon. Thank you so much. How do you say goodbye? What’s the appropriate thing to say in Morocco when you’re finishing a conversation like we just had?

Siham Lahmine (01:13:15.438)
We say, maa salama, or bislama, bislama. Bislama, be at first, bislama. Yes, bislama. Thank you all. Bye bye.

Jason Elkins (01:13:19.241)
llama?

Jason Elkins (01:13:23.166)
Baslama. Baslama. Baslama si ham. All right. Thank you so much. We’ll chat with you soon. Bye bye.

 

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